1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus and method for metering and monitoring printers within an enterprise and for providing real time enterprise printing information.
2. Description of the Related Art
Computer networks in an enterprise/organization typically include computer systems and peripherals, such as printers, connected to the computer systems. Organizations rely on printers for carrying out daily operations. An inoperative printer, due to failure or to the lack of consumable components such as toner, can disrupt operations, and waste time and resources. Thus, organizations often desire to determine the extent of usage of printers to prevent disruptions.
Computer networks typically include network printers that are connected directly to the computer network, such that the network printers may be shared by multiple users. Computer networks may also include multiple non-network printers that are connected to one or more individual computers, such that the non-network printers are used by only the computers to which it is connected. Due to the fact that non-network printers are not directly accessible via the computer network, contemporary methods of usage monitoring over the network are not applicable.
Usage of a printer is typically determined by the page count. Pages can be counted manually by sending service personnel to each printing device to procure the page counts via typical means, such as executing a printer test page. This procedure requires a considerable amount of manpower and is costly. Additionally, this procedure can be inaccurate due to human errors. One contemporary attempt to provide more accuracy in monitoring printer usage employs the counting of power surges at the printer to determine the number of pages printed. This method requires that every printer utilizes a stepper motor to advance sheets of paper during printing. Pulsing of each of the coils of the stepper motor results in pulses in the supply current which is to be detected by a separate detection circuit. The detection circuit is operably connected to both a power supply of the printer and a data collection unit. This method suffers from the drawback of being limited to particular types of printers, as well as, inaccuracies in attempting to detect power surges caused only by the coils of the stepper motor during printing. This method suffers from the further drawback of requiring costly hardware for every printer in order to detect the power surges and transmit data representative of the power surges for calculation of the printer usage.
Additionally, contemporary systems that rely on only print counts, do not account for fluctuations in the use of consumable components, such as ink or toner. Usage of consumable components is typically dependent on the type of print job that has occurred. In environments that perform large print jobs, the necessity to re-print the job because of an inadequate amount of ink, resulting in a poor quality of the print job, can be time consuming and costly. It is undesirable to replace consumable components during busy print times, especially where particular print-jobs are time sensitive. Attempting to estimate consumption of consumable components based upon printer usage is usually inaccurate for the reasons described above. Supplies for such consumable components can take time to procure resulting in further disruptions. However, over-estimates of usage of the consumable component is also costly.
In order to accurately service all of the printers within the enterprise, there is a need to accurately determine the usage of both network and non-network printers. There are currently monitoring systems for monitoring the usage of network printers. However, these systems typically cannot discover non-network printers. While there are also monitoring systems that monitor the usage of non-network printers, these systems have been unable to accurately count prints and monitor printer usage on computers that are attached to two or more non-network printers. For example, if a computer system is attached to non-network printers and the computer executes a print command for multiple duplicate print batches, for example, five copies of a five page document, these systems typically count the number of copies printed for that print command as five pages instead of twenty five pages. These systems also cannot monitor ink usage for non-network printers effectively. Therefore, these systems do not accurately report when ink cartridges need to be changed and/or the amount of ink remaining in a currently used ink cartridge.
In order to successfully provide real time enterprise printing information, there are numerous problems that need to be addressed. Specifically, each of the printers (network and non-network printers) used within the enterprise need to be identified, at any given time, there must be communications with each printer to monitor the printer for availability and usage, usage metrics must be computed in order to understand the system usage, and equipment faults and system errors must be detected and measures must be implemented to correct the detected faults and errors.
What is needed, therefore, is a process for providing reliable and affordable printing services, by assuring that any organization's printing services are always available on demand and by maintaining adequate printing supplies and monitoring for any conditions or failures that can adversely affect the services availability.